"Thank God, I am not as bad as you
can think me!"
"Then you did not come here to see La Chatre?"
"I came to see him, I admit! I was seeking him when I met you here. But
it was not because I feared discovery that I left you, nor because I
thought my miserable work was done, nor to finish it."
I saw now that she was in great agitation. She tottered forward to the
table and put her hand on it, and leaned on it for support.
It seemed as if she were speaking the truth, as if there might be some
explanation of all, but that her inward excitement was too great, her
ideas too confused, for her to assemble the facts and present them in
proper order. It seemed that she could answer my accusations only as they
came, that she acknowledged herself guilty in part towards me, and yet
did not wish me harm.
"Mademoiselle," I said, dropping my harshness and irony, "to believe you
true would make me as happy as I now am wretched. But why is your boy
here, in the governor's service? Why did he carry from you the secret of
my hiding-place?"
Mademoiselle shuddered and gave a gesture of despair, as if there were
indeed no defence for her.
"Why are the troops away, if not in quest of me?" I asked. "We saw them
going towards Maury by the river road."
"I did not know that the troops had gone, or were going," she said. "I
swear to you, monsieur, if troops have gone to Maury this night, I had
nothing to do with their going!"
"But they knew what road to take, and how to find my hiding-place.
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